1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a hand brake for motor vehicles and including a trestle provided with a toothing, a brake lever pivotally supported on the trestle, a locking paine element for retaining the brake lever on the trestle in an arbitrary selected pull position, at least one brake cable, a gripping element for the brake cable supported on the trestle, an adjusting spring for applying a biasing force to the gripping element in a rotational direction, a coupling for connecting the brake lever with the gripping element, and a spring for applying a biasing force to the coupling.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Hand brakes of the type described above are characterized in that the brake cable leading to a wheel braking element is connected to a disc segment with a circumferential toothing which serves as an adjusting disc. The adjusting disc is arranged concentrically with the brake lever. The adjusting disc is biased in a rotational direction by an adjusting spring which is formed as a helical spring. The adjusting disc is connected with the brake lever by a drive pawl which is spring-biased, in particular by a coil spring, in a return direction. The drive pawl, upon actuation of the brake lever from its release position, connects the brake lever with the adjusting disc, causing pulling of the brake cable. The drive pawl is formed in this case (see, e.g., European Publication EP-0 535 131) as a rocker one arm of which cooperates with the circumferential toothing of the disc segment which forms the adjusting disc, and the other arm of which cooperates with a reset stop fixedly mounted on the trestle which is fixedly connected with the vehicle body. With such a rocker, upon complete return of the hand brake lever into its release position, the connection of the brake lever with the adjusting disc is broken, and only the biasing force of the adjusting spring acts on the adjusting disc.
The hand brakes with an adjusting device of the above-described type are characterized in that the connection of the brake lever with the cable disc or a comparative gripping element for at least one cable is effected by a ratchet-type locking element, in particular, by a spring-biased pawl, which leads to generation of an undesirable noise upon actuation of the hand brake. In addition, the manufacturing costs of such hand brake are relatively high because only relatively small manufacturing tolerances are allowed.
Accordingly, an object of the present invention is a hand brake of the above-described type provided with adjusting means which would insure a stepless and, thereby, noiseless actuation of the hand brake, without increase of manufacturing and assembly costs.